Batman: The Brave and the Bold: "The Golden Age of Justice!"Review

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Batman and Black Canary team up with the Justice Society of America.

By Dan Phillips

"The Golden Age of Justice" begins with one of the series' best and funniest opening sequences yet, and then segues into a main story that's every bit as enjoyable as its prologue – albeit for very different reasons. For a series that's shown a propensity to deliver opening segments that outweigh their feature storylines in entertainment value, or vice versa, the episode's consistency is another promising sign that this second year might be well on its way to improving upon the mostly fantastic debut season. That it also manages to mix the show's typical brand of humor with more adult themes like death is another strong indication that Batman: The Brave and the Bold is constantly learning new tricks.

The episode's opening features Batman and the awesomely silly Detective Chimp team-up to solve an Agatha Christie like mystery, with the DCU's greatest simian sleuth using his unique skills to sniff out the true culprit in the case of The Stolen Golden Skull (whatever that is). Fans of the character will get a kick out of seeing the Detective brought to life on the screen for the first time, but those unfamiliar with the hero might even enjoy his appearance more – the sequence is punctuated brilliantly by the reveal that this monkey can in fact talk, even if he does love bananas just as much as the rest of his species.

The main story stars the entire Justice Society of America together for the first time, weaving together past history with the present-day status quo in a way that heightens both. This series hasn't always made an effort to dive into back-story with any regularity, so it's a pleasant surprise to see the JSA and their dual roles as golden age crime fighters and modern day mentors to Batman and Black Canary handled so effectively. For that matter, the episode has a more of DC Universe-wide focus to it than those of the past, making it feel in many ways like an episode of Justice League Unlimited filtered through the goofy lens of this more kid-friendly series.

Click above to watch a clip from ''The Golden Age of Justice''

Per Degaton serves as the main villain in both the flashbacks and the present day action, and while his comic book connections with Nazis are unsurprisingly underplayed, the great Clancy Brown's voice-over work is more than enough to give the maniacal rogue the necessary amount of cackling villainy. The story follows his defeat at the hands of the JSA in an ambiguous past era that resembles World War II but sidesteps any iron clad identification with that deathly serious conflict, and then picks up with his resurrection in modern times, where he reignites his feud with the Society. The villain's return unearths some old resentments in Batman and Black Canary, both of whom wish their heroic mentors would finally stop handling the next generation heroes with kiddie gloves.

As has typically been the case with this series – most recently in the Blue Beetle-centric "Revenge of the Reach!" – the episode's themes are laid down in a fairly heavy handed manner, and it's not difficult to guess how things will play out. Still, the fact that you can see the story's resolution coming from a mile away doesn't make it any less enjoyable. The interaction between the JSA, Black Canary and Batman is a joy to watch, right down to seeing the old-timers teach their pupils how to properly deliver a pithy one-liner. By the time Canary and Bats stepped up to prove their worth even as they realized why the JSA treats them in such a paternal way, the episode's accomplished everything it set out to accomplish.

What's most impressive about this episode is that it incorporates the death of the original Black Canary without undermining the lighthearted tone established by the series. This is definitely a first for the show, which fell flat on its face the one time it explicitly dealt with Batman's violent and tragic origins. That it mostly succeeded in its effort to integrate more adult themes makes me a whole lot less nervous about the upcoming "Chill of the Night," which promises to explore Joe Chill's murder of Thomas and Martha Wayne.